The North American Review

Literary Magazine Review:
The North American Review: November-December 2007

The North American Review is the United State’s oldest literary magazine, having been founded in 1815. It has been published by the University of Northern Iowa since 1968, and is currently published five times a year. It is apparently very highly respected, having won, and been competitive for, the National Magazine Award several times. It mostly publishes fiction and poetry—with an emphasis on young new talent—but will also publish creative non-fiction, especially in the fields of environmental and ecological matters, as well as some book and/or DVD reviews and art work. The issue I read was the November-December 2007 issue (Volume 292, number 6).

The first thing that I notice when I look at a literary magazine, before I do any reading, is the format. Format is something that determines whether or not I am willing to even read a journal… and, personally, I would be rather disinclined to submit to a journal that I would not be willing to read. When it comes to the North American Review, however, I found myself rather pleased with the format. Though there is quite a bit of straight text (something that is to be expected, really, in a literary magazine), the stories are broken up by images and sections of poems, which makes for slightly easier reading. Though the magazine is in black and white (with a full-color cover), it doesn’t prevent artwork from being used liberally throughout. Also, some of the stories (such as “Small Humiliations” by Nathan Leslie, starting on page 16), use images to illustrate the text. Another interesting formatting style that the review uses is that they disperse some of the poems throughout the stories. For example, within Larry Watson’s “Doctor’s Boys” two poems, Roy Bentley’s “December, 1940” and Faith Shearin’s “At the Museum” are placed within boxes. This serves not only to break-up the nine page story so that it is not solid text, but it also provides an interest context/comparison between the three works.

There is a short editorial piece, and it seems that the Review is generally a non-specific magazine, accepting submissions from all categories. However, they do have ‘themes’ for each issue; for example, they say that in the issue I read they “highlight Native American Heritage Month” by including several pieces specifically on that theme (The issue’s cover, however, was focused on the writer’s strikes that were occurring at that time in California).

My favorite piece in the entire magazine would have to be a tie between a poem, “Jesus Is a Mystery Shopper” by Holly Amos (about a man’s behaviors in church, which had me shorting in laughter), and a short story “Small Humiliations” by Nathan Leslie. Though the poem was funny and insightful regarding church goers… I love the end, where the subject of the poem takes a little taste of the Holy Water, determining that “The holy water tastes like Dasani”. In Leslie’s short story—and at two pages, I mean short—a lot of meaning and a lot of character have been packed into a very small space. The two characters, David and the rather nasty Janet, seem to jump off the page in all their trophy collecting, road-kill photographing glory, with every description packed with a huge amount of meaning and potential for interpretation.

As for least favorite story, if I have one, would have to be Diane Seuss’s “I dreamed I was a Madame”. This is not really because of subject (working in the sex industry), but rather that the poem’s formatting, listing, and total lack of capitalization really irked me. I don’t like it when poems fail to capitalize when they should; it makes my hand twitch for a pen to correct the grammar with.

Overall, I really enjoyed reading the North American Review. I am not really someone who is drawn to literary magazines, and the less-focused nature of this one is a little-bit of a draw-back for me (I tend to like magazines with a theme), but overall I would really consider reading it again, and possibly submitting to it, though I wouldn’t submit any of my fantasy/sci-fi stuff, as I didn’t get the feel that that would really fit with the magazine. Considering its status as a very well respected magazine, I cannot imagine that it is easy to get into (the website says that they read over ten thousand pieces a year), but somewhere down the road I wouldn’t mind trying my hand at getting published by them.